Criteo, the France-based ad tech company, posted its full-year
2015 results on Wednesday and the firm is continuing to show it
is the star-performer of the ad tech sector.

The company's revenue crossed $1 billion for the first time — far
outpacing the majority of the other publicly-traded ad tech
companies.

Criteo is a "performance" advertising specialist that works with
ecommerce companies to target ads at people who are likely to be
in the market for buying their products — mainly through
re-targeting (serving an ad at someone that has already viewed
your product or website.)

And where Criteo also stands apart from many of its other ad tech
competitors is that it is net profitable. Many of the other
public ad tech companies — such as Rocket Fuel and Tremor Video —
are carrying huge losses.

Criteo's net income for 2015 grew 60% year-over-year to €57
million ($64 million.) The company also increased its free
cash flow by 8% to €57 million ($64 million).

CEO Eric Eichmann tells us the key reason behind
Criteo's success

Speaking to Business Insider over the phone, shortly after the
earnings release crossed the wires, Criteo CEO Eric Eichmann said
the company's 2015 success ultimately boils down to the fact
that the majority of its clients (of which 73% are marketers,
rather than advertising agencies) treat Criteo as a sales cost
rather than a marketing cost.

For that reason (a bit like search advertising) clients don't
need to go through a process to get marketing budget sign-off: If
Criteo can prove it increased sales, spend on the platform can go
up as soon as the next day. It's uncapped spend, unlike marketing
budgets, which are often fixed over the course of a year or
quarter.

Eichmann said: "I think the reason why people want work
with us is because we deliver better performance at scale,
it's as easy as that. I can give you 20 reasons why that's the
case, but that's why they keep spending with us day in and day
out. Top on the list is that we have a technology that is
superior and we have teams that are dedicated to improving it day
in and day out, more than anybody else in the world in this
particular sector."

And spend really did go up. In the fourth quarter of 2015,
Eichmann said clients were spending 20% more than in the same
quarter in 2014. He says this is largely due to improvements
Criteo made to its technology, such as improving its mobile
offering — 25% of the company's ex-TAC revenue in the fourth
quarter came from users matched across at least two different
devices, he added.

Criteo also added more than 900 clients in the last quarter,
meaning its total number of customers crossed 10,000 last year.
On the publisher side of its business, the company added 2,000
additional publishers in the fourth quarter.

Eichmann also said Criteo's client retention rate was 90% in
the last quarter, adding: "Not many other companies can do this,
except for companies like Google."

Criteo's three objectives for 2016

After a strong 2015, expectations will be high for this
year.

Eichmann said one of his main objectives for 2016 will be to
continue to improve Criteo's technology. A search product is
currently in "proof of concept phase," it is about to deploy an
email product, and the company is exploring use of beacons to see
if it can help retailers use offline customer behavior to boost
online sales.

Acquisitions could also be likely as the company is increasingly
looking to cross-device targeting and measurement — two
complicated areas that require sophisticated tech, machine
learning, and mapping in order to pull off successfully.

In addition, two new areas of growth will be in the
mid-market and Asia, he said.

A note on EPS

Criteo's stock was up 0.35% at the time of writing.

In terms of EPS, Criteo posted €0.88 ($0.99)
for the full-year, a miss on the €0.97
($1.09) estimated
by analysts. However, for the quarter, Criteo posted a big
beat. Analysts estimated the company would post EPS
of €0.40 ($0.45) but it posted €0.55
($0.62,) in the quarter to December 31.

Eichmann said while he understands the street looks to EPS as a
guide, it is not a key measure for Criteo like it is for a more
stable, large company — such as a utility company, for
example. Adjusted EBITDA is a better indicator for Criteo's
operating profitability, he said.

Adjusted EBITDA for the full year increased 64% to €130
million ($146.5 million,) or 10.9% of revenue. For the quarter,
adjusted EBITDA increased 53% to €49 million ($55 million,)
or 13.5% of revenue.